NIGHT OF THE BLOOD BEAST (1958)
Director: Bernard Kowalski
Retromedia Entertainment

This was a very difficult film for me to review. You see, when I was just a little kid, I was first entranced by this film when I saw a review of it in Famous Monsters of Filmland. The monster looked cool. The review sounded great. And the very next night it was showing on the TV! Woohoo! So I got to stay up late and watch it and loved every second. Well now here I am, 37 years later. Now I am old and bitter and see films with a jaundiced eye. How will NIGHT OF THE BLOOD BEAST hold up? Can I re-capture that sense of wonder? Or will the film's obvious failings ruin the experience? Which will triumph? My post-modern angst? Or my lost innocence? Well, if you're the kind of person who cares about that sort of question you probably wouldn't be here on DVD Drive-In reading a review of NIGHT OF THE BLOOD BEAST anyway. You'd be off in the Experimental Cinema forum discussing Truffaut's shortcomings. So let's cut to the chase.

It's highly unlikely that you have ever heard of any of the crew or actors from NIGHT OF THE BLOOD BEAST, with the exception of Roger Corman. And sadly Roger Corman's name on a film is not always a hallmark of excellence (though in my opinion he does have a better track record than, say, Jerry Bruckheimer). The director is Bernard Kowalski, whose only real claim to fame is that he directed the "Baretta" TV show in later life. The actors are all second-stringers and obscure character actors - not a recognizable face in the bunch - unless you're a big fan of ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES, which featured most of the same actors (and the same director!).

Well, the film starts off with Earth's first manned mission into space. Or at least a cheaply-animated version of it. On the way back, something goes wrong and the poor astronaut, Major Corcoran, crashes near Los Angeles' famed Bronson Caverns, a fabled locale for cheapo monster flicks. Oh wait, I mean it crashes in the distant hills, where they're cut off from civilization.

Now that we've had over 40 years of Space Age under our belt, the assumptions of this film seem pretty wrong-headed. You could nitpick at it for hours. Example: when the capsule crashes, containing the first man ever to "go up in a satellite," NASA sends two (2) people in a jeep to find the wreck. Of course, the local NASA installation only has five (5) total personnel, consisting of two doctors, a radio man, and two more people whose job never becomes clear. And no help ever comes from outside. My favorite moment was when the characters in the film state that because their project is so totally high security, it would take longer for NASA to respond when their communications get cut off. Well anyway, if you like carping and finding fault with films for being goofy, this is a Thanksgiving feast of delights for you and your buddies. I'll try to move back to the plot.

Major Corcoran crashlands and his body is intact, except for a strange wound to one arm (which is never really explained, though attention is drawn to it). Though he's seemingly dead, with no pulse and no respiration, his body stays flexible, his temperature high, and his blood fluid. Then other strange things start happening. A big animal that the scientists mistake for a bear knocks out the radio man for no apparent purpose. Then kindly old Doctor Wyman is bloodily killed. Well now Major Corcoran mysteriously wakes up and becomes the monster's champion, arguing that we should try to communicate with it. It turns out that a sinister beast from outer space came down with the capsule and planted its embryos inside poor Major Corcoran. Corcoran is okay with this, however. He doesn't really mind.

The movie doesn't show us the beast for quite a while, trying desperately to build up some suspense. The beast looks pretty neato, if you ask me. Long tatters of flesh or cloth or something hang from its body and limbs. It has a gigantic round head and a beak-like mouth, plus long flexible claws. By the way, for a "blood beast" it is pretty mild. It only kills one person (Doctor Wyman), though it knocks out the radioman and briefly tries to kidnap an extraneous girl.

Pretty soon the movie seriously branches off from what we'd want or expect, looking back from a modern viewpoint. When Corcoran argues that we should talk to the alien, I think most of us would agree strongly. After all, it's not every chance we have to talk to an extra-terrestrial. Especially one that evidently can raise the dead. Of course there are some bad signs too - like Dr. Wyman's death and those pulsating embryos inside Major Corcoran's torso.

Corcoran points out that the monster could have killed more people, but it didn't. It tried to kidnap Donna (the extraneous girl previously mentioned) for a hostage so it could talk to the folks. Then it turns out that the reason it killed Dr. Wyman was to use his memory (and possibly his tongue and vocal cords) to communicate with the humans.

But the other NASA guys don't see it that way. They are totally berserk with the lust to kill the monster. The mysterious part here is that it's quite clear that we're supposed to side with these guys, fearing and hating the monster, and distrusting Corcoran for being under mind control. In the final confrontation, I defy any child of the modern age to be satisfied with the result.

The Best Part - alien bugs inside Corcoran.

The Worst Part - the two dorks who want to kill the monster.

I give this film a letter grade of "C-". I recommend it only if you really like old science fiction monster movies and don't care if it's any good.

The Disc - this is by Retromedia. It is in non-widescreen format, and black and white, though the cover picture is colorized. Kind of weird colonization too, makes the monster's beak look like an indentation. Anyway, there are minimal extras - a few chapters and the movie's trailer. That's all.

The movie's quality is pretty shaky. Many parts are really dark, so you can't see what's going on at certain key moments. Much of the film happens A) at night or B) indoors or C) both so this is really a problem. The sound is okay - all the characters are intelligible though the music sounds a little muffled. But I guess no one's going to clean up a master copy for this old clunker. (Sandy Petersen)

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